It was a strange coincidence that I happened to attend the CIIs Knowledge Management Meet in Chennai, India on the 28th & 29th of Oct 2009. Here are some of my observations and comments on the subject of discussion.
The theme for the meet was KM & Enterprise 2.0. Though there were representatives from various industries, it was fully dominated by the IT Service Providers, as you would expect these days. To its share of accolades the meet did in fact attract some very notable personalities, Prof. Sadagopan, Dave Snowden & David Gurteen.
Being an outsider to the entire KM initiative it gave me a very good oppurtunity to view KM from my own job function.
We all know and have learnt from our school days,” one that multiplies with sharing is knowledge”. The meet had its share of fundas and some very interesting ones too. Like Prof. Sadagopan mentions, “Knowledge as a liberator” How sharing knowledge can help us solve bigger challenges such as climate change and epidemics. The one that I particularly liked and believe should be the underlying mantra for all organizations in the KM is when he mentions, “In the Knowledge Era what determines success is not much of what you hold but how much you share”
Dave Snowdens talk was very engaging and he particularly highlighted the feature of having networks and how to make it work for you.
There were other case studies by the IT biggies on how KM had given them a strategic depth and how they measure and make it work. One common chord was that all of them were focussing too much on systems and focussing on the technology aspect of it while missing out on the culture and the eco system to promote knowledge sharing. Isn’t the essence of KM, sharing and openness, rather than protectionism?
KM & Enterprise 2.0 should foster healthy community which should break the barriers of organizations and practices, promoting a healthy competitive practices. I believe its a social responsibility.
David had an hour long exercise on his KCafe, which was very interesting.
Lakshmi Narayanan from Cognizant, did leave with a thought for all competing organizations to inter operate. Food for thought!!
End of the meet I did leave with these impressions:
- KM in an organization can never be a policy. It needs to be fostered by healthy practices and a good active eco system that fosters knowledge sharing.
- Does it require metrics & policing to measure the success? Should the success be measured with Metrics or with the results?
- It can never be / should be a separate department. It should rather be weaven into the organizations day to day to work. The healthy eco system should drive this rather than a dedicated workforce.
- It can never be campaigned it should be voluntary.
